


you can't wake up, this is not a dream

by forcedapathy



Series: we belong way down below [1]
Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Blood Drinking, M/M, Panic Attacks, Pre-Slash, Unhealthy Relationships, mention of suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-31
Updated: 2016-07-31
Packaged: 2018-07-28 07:37:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,071
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7631023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/forcedapathy/pseuds/forcedapathy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“They’re called subjugates. Horrible things.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	you can't wake up, this is not a dream

**Author's Note:**

> This work contains mention of suicide, please don't read if this will upset you.
> 
> There's no real 'romance' in this story. It wouldn't fit in the context, or be healthy. But there are hints, if you look.

“They’re called subjugates. Horrible things.”

* * *

Being kidnapped by vampires is easily number one on Simon’s list of  _ **The**_   _ **Worst Things That Have Ever Happened To Him. Like Ever.**_

In all honesty, the actual initial kidnapping isn’t all that bad. One hard whack and Simon is sent into a particularly nasty set of dreams involving wannabe Captain Americas. The waking up, however, is particularly horrific.

The agony in his head is what yanks him from unconsciousness - a particularly horrible trick of his biology. It’s probably his body’s revenge for all the junk food. A painful, persistent throbbing vibrates from the top of his head and makes its home curling at the base of his spine. He lies there for a moment, trying to take stock of why his head hurts, and why the ceiling doesn’t look like the one in his bedroom, and where the fuck is he anyway, and what is the last thing he remembers, and, oh fuck, where the hell is Clary-

Simon sits bolt upright. Then he throws up. Over and over nausea sweeps over him, until the only thing going over the side of the sofa is acid.

“Lovely,” a voice utters. The word is pronounced, measured, clear like crystal, cracking between teeth - and when Simon looks up, he can see the blurry outline of a slim figure with long dark hair. It hurts his eyes, and it hurts his head, and he presses his hands to his glasses-less eyes and rubs.

“Who, who, who are you?” Simon stammers, his heart beating with an intensity that lets Simon count each beat.  _One, two, three, four, five-six-seven…_ “Where am I? What’s going on?” His voice gets higher and higher with each syllable.

“I forgot how weak Mundane’s constitutions were,” the voice replies lightly, as if their conversation is idle chit-chat. “But never mind.”

The clip of her heels as the figure moves towards him is enough to send Simon into a panic. He desperately pulls himself backwards and over the edge of the sofa. He tumbles slightly, and his head is already fuzzy, and his mouth tastes like acid, and he can’t really see without his glasses, so he is not prepared for the figure to appear in front of him. Like an apparition. He recoils away, but the sofa is at his back, and she is at his front.

“Just relax,” she soothes, calmly, without the barest hint of stress. Her mouth is painted a vivid red, and Simon watches as it stretches over her teeth, cracking the porcelain of her face. It is a cordial, polite smile, belonging in fancy restaurants and at posh brunches. She tilts her head, watching Simon as sharp protruding  _fangs_ grow over her lips. He should be afraid, Simon thinks, idly, almost hysterically, and he almost wants to giggle. He has the oddest urge to touch her fangs with his fingers, maybe press his fingers to their tips, just to test their sharpness.  “I think we’re going to have a lot of fun together,” she tells him, reaching her hand up to his cheek. Her nail traces its path down his cheek, down his neck, and rests on his pulse. She looks at his neck intently, before her eyes resettle on his face.

She’s pretty, he thinks, a little blurrily. Really pretty. Stunning, in fact.

Being bitten doesn’t hurt nearly as much as he’d have thought.

* * *

His dreams are weird. Surreal. Dreams where everything feels a little too real and he knows it will take a few minutes in the morning to establish reality.

There is a hand massaging his thigh, and two points of pressure moving up and down his neck. It feels uncomfortable and strange. He doesn’t like it. He tries to get up, but everything is a little woozy, and the pressure increases on his thigh, pining him down. The pressure doesn’t stop though, until he gasps in pain, trying to pull the hand up. There is a sharp laugh in his ear.

Simon wants to leave, be at home, safe and secure, buried in his bed. “Why am I here?” He slurs out, and the words are hard to form: his tongue is heavy in his mouth.

She laughs again, sharp, as she runs her mouth up his neck to whisper in his ear, “your friend has something I want very much.” The air from her mouth crawls down his back, an unpleasant caress. “Or she will have. Sooner or later.” The words take too long to sink into Simon’s head.

“I don’t understand,” Simon states, blinking, leaning back to get away - away from her.

“Well,” she starts, a little coyly, her lower lip just slight protruding. “When I get… what I want, your friend gets…what she wants.” And she runs her hand down from Simon’s shoulder to his chest. “Everybody wins,” she murmurs. Something is beginning to click in Simon’s head, a nagging feeling, the air that something is very, very wrong. He wants to wake up and spring to his feet, shake off this feeling withering under his flesh. However, she just looks up, under her eyelashes, and that feeling drifts away, like smoke.

She pulls away, and Simon is abruptly relieved and abruptly disappointed.

“Not from your neck,” she muses. “It needs to heal. Give me your wrist.”

Simon gives her his wrist.

He barely even feels the bite.

* * *

He wakes up, and falls asleep. And he wakes up, and he falls asleep again. Time is blurry. Has he been here a day? Two days? A week? Simon isn’t sure. In fact, he isn’t sure where  _here_ is. His head feels pleasantly buzzed: teetering permanently on the edge of sleep and wakefulness. He thinks this should alarm him, but every time he thinks that, he feels absolutely the same after.

He wonders from time to time whether he needs to eat or drink, because he really can't remember the last time he did, and he's sure that's really not a good thing - but the thought makes his stomach recoil in disgust. The only craving he isn’t quite able to get out of his head is the one for something too acrid, too tangy. It’s like when his aunt kept making her ‘Sunday Special’ for him, and Simon could never decide whether it was the worst thing he’d ever had or the best. By the last mouthful, it was always the worst, but by next Sunday, Simon was again unsure.

It feels like shaking off a truly deep sleep when he focuses his eyes on the lamp opposite him. Its blurry shape hones into something recognisable. He is in a different room than he last remembers. The room is in sharp detail, which is weird, because Simon isn’t wearing his glasses. It is big, but dim. There are loads of candles, which some part of Simon’s brain laughs at. Like, way to overdo the whole haunted house vibe. Like, seriously, guys. Lighten up. Literally.

There is quite a few of people in the room, he observes, feeling oddly detached. It’s like he is looking at a picture, or watching the inside of a snow globe. There is the low murmur of chatter, assorted glasses with red liquid inside. Some are on ledges, some dangling from fingers, others pressed to mouths where Simon watches as throats convulse as they swallow. His eyes drift around. There is a lot of furniture. Old tables, counters, drawers, sofas, seats, chairs.

Where the hell is he?

Simon wants to shake himself. Shake the feeling vibrating under his skin off. His whole body feels stiff and uncooperative. Utterly still. The awareness of his body seems to sweep to his toes.

He flexes his fingers.

The oddest crawling sensation moves up and down his arms. It takes him a minute to place the feeling. His arms are  _itchy_. Really itchy. Itchier than when he’d got chicken pox when he was five, and his mum had told him over and over not to scratch himself. However, Simon had had poor impulse control even then: he still has the variety of chicken pox scars scattered all over his body as proof.

He stares at his arms. There are unmistakeable bite marks savaging his pale skin, really pale skin actually, up and down his arms, in a criss cross of patterns. They look old, half healed, but that doesn’t seem right. Simon is certain some of them are new.

It isn’t just his arms. His whole body feels shaky, and clammy, and cold. He tries to curl in on himself, but that hurts.

“Raphael,” someone calls, and it feels very close but very far away at the same time. Sweat seems to trail down the back of his neck.

This is when a face appears in front of him, which is something he is getting pretty sick of. He is probably around Simon’s age, or maybe a bit older, with dark hair slicked back, and a tanned face that is curiously drained of colour. He is knelt so that they are eye to eye.

“It’s not been fed enough blood recently,” whom-Simon-assumes-to-be-Raphael says. “Camille’s been away too long.”

“Give him some of ours then, Raphael,” a girl replies, sounding a little bored, who is hovering around the-now-confirmed-Raphael’s left shoulder.

Raphael hisses, fangs in his mouth bared. Simon wonders if that should scare him – but he feels too sick to care, like his head is stuffed with cotton wool. He shudders, freezing.

“No,” Raphael denies, harshly. “Only Camille has subjugates. Not us.”

His hand is pressing against Simon's forehead, and whatever he notices must displease him, because he lets out a string of harsh words in what-sounds-like Spanish. He wraps his hand around Simon’s arm and pulls him up. It isn’t too hard, but it isn’t light either. Simon sways a bit, blinking, but is propelled forward by the constant pulling motion on his arm. It seems that Raphael’s strength is the only thing keeping Simon upright: his legs feel like jelly.

They go through a sterile looking bedroom to enter a bathroom. By contrast to the bedroom, it is old fashioned, gaudy, and elaborate, as if the modernisation hasn’t dared creep past the threshold.

Raphael moves away and the sound of the shower spray hitting tile echoes. Simon shakes in the middle of the bathroom, curling his hands around his elbows. His skin feels hot, feverish, but he feels chilled to the bone.

The freezing cold of the shower spray doesn’t help this at all. Simon tries to recoil as Raphael holds him firmly under the spray. His body is wracked with shuddering now. The water seeps down Simon’s shirt, down his back, into his eyes, over his dry lips, and drips into his mouth. He hadn’t realised how dry his mouth was, and now he is unbelievably thirsty.  He doesn’t even realise he has sunk to the floor until Raphael is pulling him up.  

Raphael gives him dry clothes and a towel and averts his eyes whilst Simon changes. Neither speak, and Simon isn’t even sure he can.

The mirror in the bathroom is crystal clear, his reflection staring back at him as he dresses. Simon has always been fairly muscled; he does a fair amount of exercise to combat his constant and intense nervous energy. However, someone would be hard pressed to see that now. He looks like he’s lost a lot of weight. His ribs protrude, clear to be counted, and his stomach is sharply concave. Yellow and green bruises are scattered sporadically over his body. He dresses stiffly but hurriedly, a nervous jittery feeling beginning to develop.

What the hell? The fog is dissipating from his brain, and with its departure fear is beginning to creep in.

“Why am I here?” Simon croaks, and his voice is cracked and scratchy.

“You’re a hostage,” Raphael replies, and he turns back towards Simon. His smile is sardonic, bordering on mocking, and he leans back against the wall. “Camille thinks your friend has something she wants.”

Simon stares for a minute. What? He racks his brain, filtering through various images.  _Clary_ , he thinks.  _Clary, and her mum, and the cup_. But Clary doesn’t have the cup. She has no idea where the cup is.

“The cup?” Simon sputtered. “Clary doesn’t have the cup.” And even if she does, Simon thinks, she needs that to save her mother. Not me.

“Camille thinks she has the best shot of getting it. And when she has it, we trade it for you,” Raphael pronounces this flatly, a little detached, as if he doesn’t quite believe the words coming out of his own mouth. “An unfair trade, in my opinion, but I’ve never understood Shadowhunters and their poor taste.” Raphael rolls his eyes a bit, like it is an inside joke Simon should laugh along with. “Until then,” Raphael tells Simon, tilting his head. “You stay here.”

“And here is?”

“The Hotel DuMort,” Raphael answers, and then, after a pause, adds, “it’s French.”

“Fitting,” Simon mocks. “Did you move in before or after the name was chosen?” Simon wills himself to stop talking: cheek didn’t seem like it was going to go over well. Raphael looks at Simon like he would like nothing better than to smash his head repeatedly on the bathroom wall - as long as the brain matter didn’t splatter onto his trousers.

“You’re going to go through withdrawal,” Raphael states, ignoring Simon’s prior words. “At least until Camille returns.”

“Withdrawal?”

“Vampire blood,” Raphael responds, sounding bored. “It’s… addictive. You’re the Downworlder equivalent of a junkie.”

“Vam- Vampire blood?” And this is when Simon’s instincts really begin to scream, where adrenaline seems to be burning though the fog that has seeped into his head. “I’m not gonna turn into a-a-” Simon begins to recoil away.  _Thump, thump, thump,_  his heart sounds.

“No,” Raphael replies. “Thankfully.”

“And begging for you to help me get out of here isn’t going to be any use?” Simon asks, trying his best winning smile, which probably comes out more like a grimace.

Raphael seems to laugh a bit, smiling to himself. “No.” He then straightens up, which somehow makes him look a hundred times more intimidating, but still not as much as when he begins to stalk towards Simon. Simon tries to scramble back, which is futile as the wall is only several feet away. “Though in a few hours, you’re probably going to be begging for me to just put you out your misery.” He studies Simon’s face. “I’d advise against you trying to escape. You won’t get very far.”

“Escape? No, I’ll just hang out in this very lovely bathroom. Great design, really. Really great interior decorating, very-"

“Shut up,” Raphael snaps, looking at Simon like he is a particularly annoying yappy little poodle - a weird look of disgust, and incredulity on his face. “Just… try not to die,” Raphael advises, turning away, shaking his head in a way that Simon does when he watches a particular weird episode of the Regular Show.

“What?” Simon asks, as Raphael literally  _poofs_ away. But the only response is the click of a lock.  “Raphael?!” Simon shouts. “Raphael?!”

* * *

Simon would have thought that he would try some lame, doomed-for-failure escape attempt, despite being surrounded by vampires and in some random hotel in some forsaken place. However, several hours later all thoughts of escape are clear out of Simon’s mind.

He has never felt worse. Not even when he’d contracted food poisoning that time on holiday after eating mussels. His whole body is sweaty, his head hurts, his stomach hurts, he is cold, and then hot, and then cold again, and he is constantly retching. The most troubling thing is that since he has no food in his stomach, the only thing that is coming up is acrid and shining red blood, which scrapes up his throat. He wonders whether Raphael really would kill him if he were to ask.

He considers begging.

It seems particularly unfair to Simon that he’s facing withdrawal for something he can’t even remember taking. If Simon had been injecting himself with a cocktail of drugs, then fair is fair - but this is just unjust, in Simon’s highly professional opinion.

He wishes Clary was here. She always seemed to say or do the right thing to make things okay. She always knew the right solution.

 _I need you, Clary_ , he thinks.  _I need you._

But Clary doesn’t come, only Camille.

The relief is beyond anything Simon has ever felt. Relief and joy are mixed together, drowning him and filling his lungs. It only improves when she pierces her own wrist with her teeth, and presses the dripping wound to his mouth. It smears all around his skin in an imprint of blood.

* * *

“Of course, you can leave, darling,” Camille laughs, smiling at Simon like he is a small, stupid child. “Just walk out the door.” She leans back on the sofa, lounging in a dress that seems to be more fitting at a ball than in a old living room. “I’m not stopping you.” There are red tinges at the corner of her mouth and Simon stares at them, fixated, for a moment.

Simon gawks at her, mystified. He looks around, as if the invisible plot twist is going to jump out from behind the curtains at any minute. He scrambles up, looking at her, and tries to bolt out of the room.

He makes it halfway down the street before he can’t take another step. His whole body feels shaky, and panicky, and he feels like crying.  _Clary, his mom, his sister, even Luke._ He wants to go back to them,  _he does_ , but the thought of leaving… of leaving  _Camille_  is unbearable. She is the only constant now in his life. Even when she goes away, she comes back for Simon. Who would he be, if he left her?

He sits down on the floor, and pulls his knees up to his chest, screwing his eyes shut. The sun is going down, and he knows that this,  _this_ , is his opportunity. All he has to do is get up, and move. Just stand up. Get a cab. Run. All he has to do is stand up.

Raphael comes for him once the sun has set. “I told you you’re a hostage now,” Raphael tells him. “Accept it.” He leads Simon back to the hotel, like a small puppy. Simon hates Raphael, Simon hates himself.

“You shouldn’t have let him do that,” Raphael tells Camille, and he sounds  _angry_. “If someone is watching, they would know we have him. That puts us at risk.”

“Relax, Raphael. No one is watching. And even if they were, we have them  _vastly_  outnumbered. They wouldn’t even get past the door.” There’s steel in Camille’s voice. It’s still measured, still nice, but there’s an underlying hardness.

The muscles in Raphael’s jaw seem to jump. “They don’t have the cup. They  _still_  don’t have the cup. You’re risking us for  _nada_.”

Camille moves up to Raphael, nothing more than a blur. It’s a threat, Simon thinks. “Don’t worry yourself,  _Raphael_. If the plan fails,” and she looks at Simon here, a smile still curling around her mouth. “I’ll kill it."

* * *

It falls into a repetitive pattern. When Camille is around, everything is a woozy, weird blur, and when Camille leaves, Simon falls into withdrawal. However, occasionally, she is away long enough for Simon to become semi coherent again. It doesn’t seem to be as bad each subsequent time: his recovery time becoming faster. Raphael usually keeps him around at this point, in case Simon tries to do something like an ‘ _idiota’_.

Raphael is usually writing things – he does a lot of that – as well as telling people what to do. Orders here, instructions there. The vampires respect Raphael, Simon notices, they listen to him. They probably respect him more than Camille.

But they fear him less.

There’s not much to do - not for him anyway. He usually fills his days with movies and comics and video games, but now that’s not an option. His thoughts wonder a lot, although he tries to avoid anything too depressing, like his mom, or his sister, or Clary. He wonders whether there are posters out with his face on, whether people think he’s dead, or whether they think he’s a runaway.

It would be worse, Simon decides, if his family just never knew. If they just never knew if he was dead or alive, in pain or at peace. It makes him think about death in a way he has never wanted to before. He wonders whether there’s an afterlife, which makes him contemplate religion and worship and god. He’d never been overly devout to his Judaism, like most he knew, but being Jewish was part of who he was. Celebrating his festivals was part of who he was. And his private, but intense, belief in God had followed him his whole life. He’d never been a philosopher, he wasn’t sure if God always had a plan, but he hoped for himself that this wasn’t it.

He mumbles some prayers to himself, in the best Hebrew he can remember. He’s frustrated, because they’re hard to pull up in the murkiness of his head, but they’re there.  _Think_ , he tells himself,  _think_.

“Simon!” The voice pulls him out of his reverie, and Simon looks up, blinking. Raphael is sat at his desk, a pen in his hand, ignoring the documents in front of him. He looks annoyed, well, more annoyed than usual. His teeth are a bit bared.

“What?” Simon asks, shifting on the sofa on which he’s sat cross legged, a jumper on, a blanket strewn over his lap. He gets cold a lot now, because he’s lost a lot of weight, but also because the Hotel never seems to have the heaters on. Maybe Vampires don’t feel the cold - he’s not sure. They’re not exactly the warmest and fuzziest creatures.

“I said, we can get you a copy of the Tanakh, if you’d like,” Raphael says, irritated and flat.

“I thought you couldn’t touch Holy stuff,” Simon comments, like a knee jerk reaction, blinking.

“That’s not necessarily true,” Raphael tells him, leaning back in his seat.

“No?”

“I was raised a good Catholic,” Raphael informs him. “Jewish symbols don’t bother me.”

“Oh, that’s interesting,” Simon hums. What about atheists, Simon ponders, are they invincible? What about different offshoots of religion? What if one denomination uses a symbol which the other doesn’t? And who writes the rules for this?

“Interesting?” Raphael asks, raising his eyebrows at Simon. “I wouldn’t try throwing any Bibles at me.” Raphael smiles, but it’s really a grimace, showing a flash of fangs. 

“I know, I know,” Simon mumbles under his breathe, and it’s weird, because they’re kind of chatting, but Simon’s a prisoner, and Raphael is… is his what? His captor? Or is that just Camille? “Big Scary Kidnapping Vampire.”

Raphael is gracious enough to pretend that he didn't hear him.

* * *

Camille’s usually quite good at knowing when to stop leeching his blood. Enough to make him docile, but not enough that he’ll die. It’s a fragile balance, Simon reckons. Unfortunately, when she’s high off something, head lolling and eyes glazed, and she’s drinking from him constantly on and off, she doesn’t quite know.

It’s a weird feeling because there’s some part of his brain that’s telling Simon that he’s an _'_ _idiota'_ \- in a voice which sounds suspiciously like Raphael's, which is just a whole new level of disturbing -and that he needs to  _do_ something, but the other part of him wants to just lie there and drift off. He wants to just descend into this feeling of bliss and enjoy the moment.

“That’s enough, Camille,” and it’s Raphael speaking because Raphael  _always_  ruins the fun. Yet, at the same time, Simon really loves Raphael right now, because Simon has the oddest feeling that if Camille carries on, he’s probably going to die.

“Raphael,” Camille whines coyly. Her lips are blood red, which makes Simon giggle a bit, because they’re  _literally_  blood red – not just metaphorically.

“¡Basta ya!” Raphael hisses. “You’re going to kill him – and then how will your plans end?”

“You’re no fun,” Camille tells him, narrowing her eyes, reaching over for her champagne glass filled to the brim with red liquid.

“Get up, Simon,” Raphael orders, and Simon tries,  _he does_ , because Raphael is scary and is the kind of person you listen to, but he just can’t feel his legs. He’s sweating a lot too, and he feels so sick.

He tells Raphael as such.

“¡Dios!” Raphael snaps, and then picks Simon up like he’s a little girl, bridal style. He wonders if he should protest, but Simon recognises that Raphael is his best bet right now, and also that Raphael won’t listen to a word that Simon says.

Simon also clings on because the floor is fricking moving, and has to equally will himself not to be sick on Raphael - because Raphael will tear his kidneys out with surgeon like precision and make him eat them.

Raphael places him on a bed as Simon shivers, cradling his arm to his chest.

“You wear overly pretentious belt buckles, do you know that?” Simon gets out between the clacking of his teeth.

Raphael raises his eyebrows, thoroughly unimpressed. “Stay here.”

Simon rolls over, pressing his face into a pillow, and curling up. “Stay here? Stay here? No, I was just going out,” he mumbles to himself, smiling at his own joke. Which, actually, it wasn’t even a joke. He’s lost his sense of humour. Tragic.

“Even blood loss can’t shut you up,” Raphael sighs. And  _wow_ , that was  _fast_ , even for a vampire. He has something in his hand now, and Simon squints at it, trying to focus. Raphael reaches down and grabs his arm, flipping it over.

“Did you just lick me?!” Simon asks, half dazed but still disbelieving.

“Vampire saliva is an antiseptic.”

“But why-” Simon starts, before switching track. “What are you doing?”

“Saving your life,” Raphael tells him. “You’ve lost too much blood.”

“Are you giving me a transfusion?” Simon asks, alarmed. “Because I think only doctors should do that. There are blood types and stuff. Rules. Not that I don’t think you’re not an expert in blood. Just that you’re only an expert in taking the blood. Not giving the blood. Which, I think, in my non expert opinion, is just a very bad idea-”

“Shut up.” And the annoyance in Raphael’s voice is apparent.

Simon shuts up.

“I’m not transfusing. Adam is. He was a doctor.”

“In 1785?”

“1991, actually,” another voice chimes in. The guy’s oldish looking, probably died in his 50s, and he’s fiddling with a tube.

“I don’t know if I’m comfortable with this,” Simon protests weakly.

“Are you comfortable with dying?” Raphael asks, which, yeah,  _okay_ , that shuts Simon up momentarily. This turns out to be a bad move, because the talking was what was keeping Simon awake and conscious, and now he kind of drifts.

He feels a pinch, when something slides into his arm, and he tries to drag himself awake. But he’s too out of it. He just floats for a bit, thinking about vampires, and Shadowhunters, and blood transfusions, and vampires who used to be doctors, and it all gels into one weird mess in his head. He dreams about a weird combination of these things - which ultimately leads him in his dream to be beaten to death by a koala demon armed with his guitar and a pack of Twinkies.

* * *

Simon wakes up.

He feels surprisingly okay, he thinks, sitting up and stretching his body out. There's a glass of water placed on the bedside table, and he doesn't really think anything of it before he picks it up and chugs. His thirst seems to run away from him, and he finishes it in seconds, wanting another. When did he last drink water? he wonders, wracking his brain. Is this a sign of some sort? Has the near death experience cleansed him of the vampire influence?

"That could've been poisoned," Raphael's voice rings out into the silence, startling Simon into dropping the glass in his hand. It tumbles to the floor and smashes.

"Ummm," Simon starts, looking at the mess on the floor.

Raphael has closed his eyes, as if trying to find some inner strength, before he reopens them slowly and sighs. He's sitting on a chair across the room, a bag of blood in his hands, wearing his usual suit - because all vampires seem to be perpetually overdressed. Unless this is meant to be Simon’s funeral?

"You nearly died," Raphael says, looking at Simon. His voice is completely flat and detached, but his gaze is intense, and his face looks stern.

"Well, I didn't," Simon replies, lightly. "Good fortune, and all that."

"It wasn't good fortune," Raphael counters, standing up stiffly. There’s tension running up Raphael’s body. "It was my interference."

"Thank you?" Simon responds sarcastically, and a bit confused, because Raphael sounds angry now - but Simon really doesn't think this is his fault, and he also feels it's more Raphael's fault than his, so he's not going to properly thank him. He still has some dignity left. Like a tiny modicum. But still.

“I don’t want your gratitude,” Raphael says, and he definitely sounds pissed now. His jaw is tense, and there’s stress running in a line all down his shoulders and his back. “None of this would have happened. Not if I was in charge.” Raphael states this, not apologetically, but clinically.

“You’d be a better leader than Camille,” Simon tells him, and he means it. Not just because Raphael isn’t half the sadist Camille is, but because he’s a pragmatist, and he  _cares –_ in his own way, at least. He knows Raphael can't get Simon out, not while Camille is leader, otherwise he'll be the one with his throat ripped out. Or maybe not - Simon gets the feeling Raphael could take her. But there's other stuff, Simon knows. They have their own politics, their own system, removing Camille could make the whole castle collapse.

“Of course you’d say that,” Raphael replies. His hands are in his pockets, and he’s just watching Simon. He feels a little bit like a butterfly pinned underneath a glass case.

“Maybe,” Simon counters, tiredly, because the blood loss combined with the blood replenishment has left him feeling a bit weak and drained. “But I mean it too.”

Quietness hangs awkwardly in the air, a bit too intense.

“Here,” Raphael tells him and tosses Simon the blood in his hands. It takes him by surprise, but he tries to catch it anyway, flailing awkwardly. It falls into his lap as Raphael looks at him, an eyebrow raised and thoroughly unimpressed. “Drink some of that,” he orders.

“Um, dude,” Simon says. “I think I’m still human, and we don’t usually drink blood for sustenance. It might have been a while since you were human – how old are you, anyway? - but you should know that I don’t drink blood. Well, except for Camille's, but that's weird vampire coercion.  Wait, I am human, aren’t I? I didn’t actually die so-”

Simon gets the _look_ for his trouble. “You’re not a vampire.”

“Okay, so why-”

“Vampire blood has healing properties, and you have a high tolerance now. Just-”

“Don’t drink enough to get high?”

“Preferentially.”

“Is it Camille’s?” Simon asks, his voice thick, gingerly picking up the blood bag. He really doesn’t feel like drinking anything that has ever even been in Camille’s shadow, let alone _circulating_  or something inside her, because he really, really hates Camille - more than he’d ever even known he could hate anyone.

“No.” Raphael’s face is blank, devoid of emotion. There’s an awkward moment.

“Okay,” Simon says, then bites the bullet, “is it yours?”

Raphael sighs, then looks away. “Yes, Simon. It’s mine.”

“Oh.”

There's another moment of weirdness, because Simon doesn't think he feels bad enough to want to drink blood, like ever, before Raphael tells him, without any real malice, "you can either drink it yourself, or I can make you."

Simon believes Raphael, and decides to take the easy option.

He drinks the blood through a tube coming from the top, because apparently everything really is like the Vampire Diaries. As it turns out, when you aren’t high, and you’re drinking it out a bag, it tastes pretty bad. 

And it's really fucking weird.

* * *

“Camille’s been gone a while,” Simon comments, picking at his fraying jeans. It’s late, because Simon keeps the same hours as the vampires now, and he's also very much recovered from his bloodloss experience thanks to vampire blood, and so doesn't sleep constantly anymore. It’s not like there’s any sunlight in the hotel though, so it’s not too bad - his internal body clock had been confused for a while though.

“Yes,” Raphael replies, whilst not even looking up from whatever he’s writing now.

“Does she usually go away often?”

Raphael glances up briefly. “I don’t think that’s your concern.”

“I feel like it is,” Simon argues, annoyed. Normally he’d have dropped it, but, well, he’s  _bored_. Simon feels a bit guilty for this, like he should be sat sobbing, or having an existential crisis, whilst his loved ones worry about him - but he’s been there and he’s done that and he’s  _bored_. “I don’t think that it’s very good leading,” Simon adds on, a little pointedly.

Raphael sighs, and puts his pen down, closing his eyes for a moment. “Are you capable of ever being quiet when you're not sleeping?”

“I happen to know that I talk in my sleep," Simon bitches. "But yes,” he adds petulantly. “When I’m not  _bored_.” He pauses. “I don’t suppose you have a PlayStation or anything?”

Raphael sighs. Again. It seems to be Raphael’s constant setting. Simon speaks,  _sigh_ , Simon moves,  _sigh_ , Simon breathes,  _sigh_.  _Sigh, sigh, sigh_. Sighing was  _boring_.

“Somebody will. But I can’t have you around the others without me being there.”

“Why not?”

“I’m not clan leader,” Raphael says, and it might be Simon’s imagination, but he sounds a little aggravated at this. “My orders don’t have the same effect as Camille’s. It only takes one vampire to lose control.”

“And Camille hasn’t told them it’s fine to not kill me?” Simon asks incredulously, because,  _hello_ , bad planning  _again_.

“Camille has a no kill order,” Raphael snaps. “One that she’s barely followed herself. That doesn’t mean they won’t use you as a drinking fountain. This situation is bad enough without us returning you looking like a chew toy.”

 _I already do,_ Simon wants to say, but decides against it since he really doesn't want any more ugly scars. The thought makes him shift uncomfortably. “Can’t they just come in here?”

Raphael looks at him, then opens his mouth, showing his elongated fangs. “They wouldn’t dare.”

Simon swallows nervously, feeling quite intimidated, but pushes it down. Raphael’s talking has only reassured him that Raphael isn’t planning on pulling his heart out of his chest on a whim or anything else unseemly or painful sounding.

“I can keep badgering you, if there’s nothing for me to do.”

Raphael scowls. “There’s some books on my shelves.” He nods across the room and Simon pads over to squint at them.

They’re surprisingly not a hundred years old with cobwebs and dust hanging off them. “Do you just own like all classics? Not a single comic book? Batman, maybe? Deadpool?”

Raphael gives him  _the look_.

Simon runs his finger down the spines. There’s an assorted variety of history books, which don’t seem to be covering mundane history, some titles in Spanish that Simon can’t read, and an assorted variety of religious tomes. A copy of the Tanakh is at the end of the shelf. It looks new. Simon swallows. He almost expects his hand to burn when he picks it up, but nothing happens. It feels like glass in his hands, like if he moves too quickly it’ll smash into a thousand pieces. He strokes the cover almost reverently. Then places it back on the shelf.

It seems too personal to read it in front of Raphael. Too intimate. It’s strange because Simon’s never really felt that way about his religion before, but there it is.

He picks out a book on ‘Vampire History in Europe during the Middle Ages’, and settles down to read, deliberately not looking at Raphael.

* * *

The next day, once Raphael has dragged Simon into his office/scheming den/whatever-he-calls-it, he shoves Simon a white, new looking DS with a small blue pouch full of games.

"On the condition you shut up," he tells Simon in the unamused, flat, sarcastic tone that Simon has only ever heard from Raphael.

Simon opens his mouth, takes in Raphael's expression, and, for once in his life, thinks better of it. He closes his mouth with an audible clack of teeth. Raphael stares at him for a moment, almost suspiciously - which is just hilarious, really - and then goes back to his desk.

* * *

"How long have I been here?" Simon asks, putting the DS down for the first time in hours, since he's now got a raging headache in his temple from staring at the screen. 

Raphael is currently reading something at his desk, and grinding his teeth intermittently. It probably isn't a good time, but the kidnapping hadn't taken place at a good time for Simon either, so this is just life.

"Two months," Raphael replies, not even looking up.

“Two months?" Simon feels a bit sick at that. He's been here two months?

"Do I have to repeat myself?" Raphael responds, sounding bored.

"Oh, I'm sorry, am I inconveniencing you?" Simon snaps back, voice dripping with contempt. Two months, two whole months, he curses. "I would hate to be a burden to you. What a great big annoyance this must be in your life! It's not like _you_ took _me_ hostage as part of some diabolical evil plan!"

Raphael looks at him for a moment, as if checking to make sure that Simon did just actually say that, before responding. “You do realise your friends got you into this mess. They left you unprotected, out in the open.”

Simon splutters indignantly. “ _You_  kidnapped me! How was that  _their_  fault?”

“They left you unprotected,” Raphael explains as if this is a perfectly sound and reasonable explanation, which it totally is  _not._ He’s completely crazy, Simon realises, he’s been kidnapped by an utter nut job. A total kidnapping vampire loon. Simon looks at him in absolute disbelief, as Raphael gives Simon a  _look_. “There’s always a danger in the Downworld. We all know that. We protect our own. They didn’t protect you,” Raphael clarifies slowly, like Simon is dumb.  

And Raphael is  _totally_  wrong, but in hindsight, Simon does actually maybe agree that Izzy shouldn’t have sent him to the truck alone. But that’s beside the  _point_.

“That’s just- that really is- I can’t believe you would try and- you are-” By this point Simon has stood up, his blanket in a heap at his feat, flailing his arms around furiously.

Raphael is looking at Simon with a mixture of disbelief, annoyance, fury, and boredom - Simon hadn’t even known faces could have all that emotion. “Your friends-”

“You don’t know anything about Clary-”

“Clary? Oh, you mean the newly found rojita Shadowhunter who bounces from one disaster to the next?”

Simon can feel his cheeks steadily getting hotter and hotter. “Clary isn’t like that!”

“No? Then why has no one tried to break you out yet?” Raphael asks, leaning back and gesturing around. “Only so many places you can hide a mundane in the Shadow world, but they still haven’t figured it out.”

"She’s looking,” Simon insists. “I know she is. She’s my best friend.” He gesticulates wildly to make his point.

“I didn’t say she’s not looking,” Raphael counters. “I just don’t have much faith in Shadowhunter abilities. Call me a cynic.”

“But you think they’ll get the cup?” Simon asks incredulously.

There’s a pause. “ _Camille_  thinks they’ll get the cup,” Raphael admits, sounding aggravated. “I have some reservations.”

“Great,” Simon mutters. “That’s just great. Even the kidnapping vampire doesn’t believe this plan.”

Raphael clenches his jaw rhythmically, looking like he’s about to break his own teeth under all that pressure. Is he annoyed at Simon, or is he annoyed at Camille? Simon wonders. He hopes it’s Camille. Simon has been dodging death in a house of vampires for quite a while, two months as it turns out, and he doesn’t really want his throat ripped out now.

“I’m just really hoping that there’s a version of this where I don’t end up dead! Because, to be quite honest, no one’s giving me a hell of a lot of reasons to be hopeful!”

Simon’s blinking quite hard now _. Don’t cry_ , he thinks furiously,  _don’t you dare cry_. He’s dealt with a fair amount recently, and being snapped at by a murderous, angry, vampire, who is acting like Simon is a dead man walking, is not helping anything.  _You’re not going to die, you’re not going to die, you’re not going to die,_ he tells himself, willing himself to calm down.

But his breath is getting increasingly short, and the whole room is spinning, and he’s feeling clammy, and he’s just shaking and shaking and shaking. He can’t breathe. He just can’t breathe. This realisation just makes it worse and his chest is positively aching now.

“Simon!” Raphael is right in front of him at this point, reaching out to grab Simon’s face to force him to look straight at Raphael.

They’re literally just staring into each other’s eyes now, which,  _woah_ , Simon thinks would make him feel uncomfortable at any other time, but not right now. He actually feels a lot better now. He’s so chilled, but in a good way, like when he's had the occasional joint before.

“What are you doing to me?” Simon asks Raphael, his voice slurring a bit.

“Encanto.”

“What?”

Raphael sighs. “Encanto. It’s like…”

“I thought the weird mind control just happened when I had vampire blood?” Simon asks, ignoring Raphael completely.

“No, they’re different things.”

“That clarifies a lot.”

Raphael shifts, sighing. “Encanto is temporary, no side effects. Vampire blood changes you. It makes you more like us.”

“I thought you said I wasn’t turning into a vampire?!” Simon accuses, but still chilled, as if they're talking about the weather.

“You’re not. You’d have to die to turn,” Raphael says this to him like Simon is dumb, which is just  _exasperating_. It’s not like Simon is in anyway an expert on these things.

“So what? Even if I killed myself I’d still be stuck with vampires?”

There’s a pause - and Simon's not really sure why _that_ came out, but he does feel a bit drunk, which is a state which has never improved Simon's already seriously lacking brain to mouth filter. Raphael leans back in his chair staring at Simon blankly, as Simon’s face grows steadily more crimson.

It’s not like the _idea_ of suicide has never crossed his mind whilst he’s been at the  _Hotel DesVivants_. But...

“Not that I’d want to,” Simon says hurriedly, not letting himself fall into this train of thought. “Just, like idle speculation. Nothing serious. Just covering all bases. Worst case scenario plan.”

The silence settles too long, before Raphael seems to graciously decide to ignore the last few points of the conversation to answer his earlier question. “No. Not necessarily. You’d have to be put through the process. It’s involved.”

“Oh, okay.”

“You wouldn’t want it?” Raphael asks.

“To be a vampire?”

“To have immortality, strength, speed, power.”

Simon gulps. “I like being human,” he says honestly.

“You’d rather die than be a vampire?”

“I…” Simon hesitates – because he doesn’t know. He really doesn’t know. To be a monster? To drink blood? To be trapped by the sunlight? To live forever and have to watch all those he love die?

None of that appeals to Simon.

But to just die? To never see his mother again, his sister, his best friend? There are so many places he still wants to go to, so many things that he still wants to do. He isn’t ready to die, not now.

Simon swallows nervously.

* * *

Following Raphael around like a kicked puppy isn’t just restricted to when it’s just the two of them. He ends up sat with a large group of them now and again, sometimes even when he’s feeling a little more alert. Raphael has certain people who seem to follow his orders without question, and with whom he spends most of his time. There's about ten or eleven that Simon thinks he could name off the top of his head.

They’re a weird collection of people – all nationalities, ethnicities, physical age, and personalities. More often than not, Simon’s invisible to them. Like a particularly drab lampshade. This time they’re all relaxed, chatting, drinking blood, the usual stuff. It’s strange because Simon is sure Raphael just laughed. An almost barely there chuckle, but still. His throat convulses slightly with it, and Simon is fixated. Is that a side effect of the vampire blood? Simon’s not sure. Maybe it’s just Stockholm syndrome? But that doesn’t seem right. Simon doesn’t have any fuzzy feelings towards Raphael.

Does he?

It takes a moment for Simon to realise that the bizarrely-pleasant atmosphere has completely vanished. Died a sudden and abrupt death. He blinks himself back into reality to see Camille standing there like Satan’s incarnate with an accompanying sound of silence.

“It didn’t go well?” It’s Raphael who speaks up, not that Simon thinks it would have been any different. His voice is a bit cocky, a bit mocking, no hint of concern.

“No,” Camille hisses, and she sounds angry. “They don’t have the cup.” She looks around the room, until her eyes lock onto Simon. He shrinks back into his seat, wanting to just become invisible again. “And I see that  _thing_  is still here.” She points at Simon and bares her teeth - the image of a rabid poodle flicks into Simon's head. Simon wonders how much it takes Raphael not to say ‘I told you so’.

“He’s here under  _your_  orders,” Raphael replies, disbelievingly, emphasising the  _your_.

Simon goes from the edge of the room to the centre. The speed takes Simon off-balance, and her hand is digging deeply into Simon’s arm. He bruises easily now, and he knows his arm will have a circle of black bruises soon.  _Bitch_ , he thinks.

“He’s proving to be useless,” Camille spits.

“You can’t kill him,” Raphael states, looking at her perplexed. “You’ll start a war.”

“Only if they find the body,” she rejoins.

 _Thump, thump, thump_. Simon’s heart begins to rocket.  _Don’t panic, don’t panic, don’t panic,_ he chants. Struggling will only make it worse, or was that with snakes?

Simon keeps his mouth shut. Previously, he’d have thought of a snarky comment – maybe, ‘that’s a little harsh, don’t you think?’ but he doesn’t dare. It doesn’t matter though because she’s clocked back onto him. The effects of her blood have worn off now. Instead of the usual blast of joy he would usually see at her routine, he just feels a deep and acute sense of fear and loathing, like a low thrumming throughout his body.

“I’m thirsty - dealing with Shadowhunters is tiring work,” Camille announces, looking tensely at the group of vampires, her jaw stiff. “Get me a drink,” she orders, beginning to trail her sharp nails down his neck. They're hard pin pricks of painful pressure that he tries and fails to cringe away from. The implication is blindingly clear. Immediately, several of them further away from Raphael jump to their feet. “Not you,” Camille snaps. “Raphael.”

There’s a silence. This is a power-play that even Simon can see. Too obvious. _She's losing her touch_ , Simon surmises, and _don’t leave_ , he wants to beg, but he doesn’t dare interfere in what’s happening here.

Raphael stands up slowly, adjusting the cufflinks on his jacket. “Right away,” he responds, and it’s decidedly mocking. Almost a taunt, proven only by his refusal to speed away by moving with measured steps.

“Raphael has been keeping you all entertained?” Camille asks, looking around the room. No one answers. “Playing nice with the Shadowhunters. Following the rules of the Clave. Like little lapdogs.”

“Raphael’s right,” a voice interjects. There’s some shifting. Simon looks to see who dared to reply - he’s probably, physically, in his late 20s and early 30s, with dark brown skin, and long dreadlocks. “You’re taking us to war.”

“War?” Camille seethes. “All they’ve every brought us is war. The only way to avoid war is to get  _the cup_.”

“You’re taking us to war with the Clave  _and_  Valentine. You have alienated our allies. You’re leading us to slaughter.” It’s a girl who speaks up now, looking like she was in her mid-twenties, with long dark black hair. She's one of Raphael's, Simon knows.

“I think that what she’s saying is that you don’t deserve to be our leader,” Raphael says, leaning against the doorframe. There’s a packet of blood in his hands, and he throws it to Camille, smiling at her. The packet is a blur, and it’s only Camille’s reflexes that allow her to catch it.

“This is animal blood,” Camille states, and she sounds tense now. Furious.

“That’s what we all drink, Camille. We all follow the accords. We all keep the peace.” Raphael straightens up, opening his arms as if mimicking a hug, and walks towards her and Simon. Stalking forward. “Except for you,” Raphael adds. “I’m glad everyone’s here, Camille, to witness your demise. We’ve had enough of your ways.”

Camille stills. It’s unnerving; it’s the immobility of a snake before it goes in for the kill. “Are you trying to overthrow me?” Camille asks, and her fangs are elongating in her mouth, eyes narrowing.

“No,” Raphael denies. “I already  _have_.”

“Raphael doesn't know the first thing about leading,” Camille scoffs, looking around at them incredulously. “You  _need_  me. I've given you everything you could want. All the riches. All the pleasures you could desire,” she looks around the room again, but no one moves.

“By breaking the law,” Raphael counters. “Which will only destroy us.”  His face and tone are darker now. He's always been frightening, Simon recalls, but never more frightening than Camille. Not until now anyway. Not until he’s facing Camille with the rest of the vampires behind him.

“He smells like you, Raphael,” Camille observes, sweetly, running her hand down Simon's arm and digging her nails in as she does it. He tries to flinch away, but she grabs back onto his arm again, holding it tight enough that he gasps out in pain. Her face stretches into a smile that has never brought good things. “Giving him your blood? I think you like this one.”

Raphael looks away incredulously, and rolls his eyes. “Don’t be-”

“You want peace with the Shadowhunters, Raphael?” Camille spits. “Well, good luck with that.”

Simon should have seen it coming really. He should have tried harder to move away from her. Backed somewhere away from the game of politics he was watching. But he didn’t. Usually when Camille bites him, it’s almost completely numb. The initial pain fades away into a soothing sense of europhia.

That does not happen this time.

It hurts too much to be unintentional. His whole body rebels, trying to flinch away - it’s a base instinct reaction that he can’t control. Her arms are like steel bands, holding him in place. He can feel the pull of his blood into her mouth, can literally feel her draining his life away. It’s happening so fast, and he’s starting to feel really sick, really anxious, his whole body feeling lighter, and woozy. His heart is beating faster with the adrenaline, and Simon thinks that’s so counterintuitive, that it’ll just kill him faster.

There are other hands on him though; people trying to pull him back. Pull them apart. But Camille bites harder, shaking his whole body like a toy. His skin is tearing from the roughness,  _she’s tearing his throat out_ , and he can smell blood running down his neck, feel the wet all over his collar. And it’s all happening so fast, a mere several seconds, but he’s already had time to realise he’s going to die. And he’s not ready, not ready for that at all. Now it’s here, now that it’s real, he’s just not ready. He struggles, but his movements are heavy, and stiff, and he  _can’t_. He just can’t.

“Camille! Camille! Stop! Camille!” someone is saying.

Which is a shame really, because her name turns out to be the last thing he hears before he dies.

* * *

Raphael had said to him, before, ‘you’d rather die than be a vampire?’

He had thought of his mother, his sister, his best friend. He’d thought about how much he loved them. How much he wanted to see them again. He had thought about Camille, and how much of a monster she was. Then he thought of Raphael, who wasn’t so bad, it seemed.

“No,” he had said, eventually. It had taken so long that Raphael had probably thought he wouldn’t answer.

Raphael had looked at him, face blank, not seeming angry for once, and nodded.

* * *

By the time he’s fully cognisant, he’s surrounded by the smell of blood and dirt. His whole body feels weird: his gums and teeth _ache_ , his head feels confused, his muscles seem sore but coiled with energy.

He’s kneeling in what seems to be a pile of mud, which explains the whole smell of dirt, and he struggles to push himself upright. It's pitch black, but the longer he looks, the clearer everything is becoming. He scrambles to his feet, and he scans the area until his eyes settle on a figure a few feet away.

He wears all black, blending into the darkness. His hair is slicked back, and his skin is strangely drained of life. He looks calm and collected.

“Raphael,” he rasps, wiping the blood from around his mouth with the back of his hand.

“Hello, Simon,” Raphael says calmly. “I’m the new administration.”

 


End file.
